


you're all I see (my feelings are true)

by transstevebucky



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: (it's only mentioned and isn't explicit), F/F, Fluff, Friends to Lovers, Genderfluid!Louis, Girl Direction, Homophobia, Mutual Pining
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-22
Updated: 2015-06-22
Packaged: 2018-04-05 15:17:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,745
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4184724
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/transstevebucky/pseuds/transstevebucky
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>“How do you feel today?” Nick asks, rolling Louis off of her body and propping herself up on one elbow.</i>
</p><p> </p><p> <i>Louis feels a bit winded at how gorgeous she is; brown hair choppy around her face, freckles dusting her cheeks, brown eyes still sleep fuzzy. She must have come over here straight after she woke up, which is oddly comforting. Nick knows her so well, knows exactly what she needs all of the time, and Louis loves that she can have that, that having someone who just wants her to be happy is an actual thing, now, not just a weak hope.</i></p><p> </p><p>  <i>“Like a girl, I think,” Louis responds, biting her lip, “also tired.”</i></p><p> </p><p> <i></i><br/>or, Louis has a crush on her best friend.</p>
            </blockquote>





	you're all I see (my feelings are true)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [nouiiam](https://archiveofourown.org/users/nouiiam/gifts).



> title from You're My Best Friend by Queen.
> 
> Happy early birthday, Mikaela, I hope you like this!!!

The first thing Louis sees when she jerks awake is Nick Grimshaw’s leering face.

It’s not exactly uncommon; they are best friends, after all, but Louis didn’t get home until two last night and Nick’s face is a bit too much for her. In another world (a world where Nick liked her back), Louis would grab Nick and kiss her until she’s panting.

In this world, she shoves Nick straight off of her crappy single bed.

Nick lands with a grumble on the floor, and a couple of seconds later Louis rolls off of the side of her bed and collapses on top of her friend, a dead weight.

“You’re such an asshole,” Nick mutters, and Louis grins where her face is pressed to Nick’s neck, “I didn’t do _anything_ to you.”

“You woke me up,” she mutters, “this is your penance.”

If she’s being honest, she’s not that bothered about it. She’d rather get woken up by Nick than her mum any day (Jay has a habit of being way too smug about Louis’s hangovers, whereas Nick is sweet and gets her everything she wants).

Nick snorts a laugh into her hair, and Louis wishes her heart didn’t kick into motion at that, tummy swirling with butterflies. She likes Nick so much, more than she should, really, and she wishes it would stop so that at least one thing in her life wasn’t confusing.

“How do you feel today?” Nick asks, rolling Louis off of her body and propping herself up on one elbow.

Louis feels a bit winded at how gorgeous she is; brown hair choppy around her face, freckles dusting her cheeks, brown eyes still sleep fuzzy. She must have come over here straight after she woke up, which is oddly comforting. Nick knows her so well, knows exactly what she needs all of the time, and Louis loves that she can have that, that having someone who just wants her to be happy is an actual thing, now, not just a weak hope.

“Like a girl, I think,” Louis responds, biting her lip, “also tired.”

Nick smiles at her, pressing a gentle kiss to Louis’s forehead before wriggling to her knees, tank top exposing her belly button.

Louis pokes it and grins wickedly when Nick squirms, quickly rolling across her carpet when the girl makes to lurch towards her.

“How are you? How was your nan?” Louis feels her tone get softer as she speaks, knowing how much it can hurt when someone doesn’t react well to a coming out, and how support helps you feel less awful.

Nick hadn’t planned to come out, but then when she’d gotten to her nan’s the old woman wouldn’t shut up about Nick finding a nice boy, and Nick had sat her down to tell her everything.

Louis’s phone had died shortly after, and because she’d been out drinking there’d been no way to charge it up. When she’d went to bed last night, she’d been so drunk that she completely forgot about Nick (there was, it seemed, a first for everything), and had collapsed into her own bed before passing out.

Nick pales a little, and Louis makes a noise of sadness and crawls over to the girl, wrapping her arms tightly around her.

Nick starts shaking before she starts speaking, and Louis just tucks her head into the hollow of Nick’s throat and waits.

“She was crap,” she mumbles, “she kept saying that I’d change my mind, that it was a phase. She called me a dyke, and when I told her not to use that word, she just said that I ‘deserved it’.”

Louis feels white hot anger burst through her, the idea of anyone hurting Nick like that making her see red. She’s never experienced anything like that, really, because when she’d come out her mum had fielded calls from her family and refused to talk to them if they were cruel towards her.

Nick’s mum and dad have always been a bit different, a bit more clumsy and ignorant. She’s never had that kind of support, so to have someone talking to her like that, it must have shaken her up hard.

Louis squeezes her tight.

“It’s not a phase, though,” Nick grunts, pulling Louis away and looking her in the eye, “if it were a phase I wouldn’t like –.” She freezes, suddenly, eyes going hard, body going still, and Louis frowns at her.

“Like who, babe?” Louis asks, tentative, a small spark lighting somewhere in her chest. She wants, so badly, for it to be her that Nick likes, but she knows it can’t be. Nick has so many friends, so many _beautiful_ friends, and whilst Louis knows she isn’t hideous, she also knows she’s not really Nick’s type.

“No one,” Nick laughs, eyes suddenly wild and frantic as she pulls Louis to her feet, “I don’t like anyone.”

Louis knows she’s lying, but she lets herself be lead into her own kitchen, anyway.

**+**

Jay stumbles down the stairs half an hour later, a twin on each hip and soft smile on her face.

 Louis makes grabby hands at Doris, and Jay passes her over, clearly barely paying attention. She’s looking at Nick. Louis is slightly offended; she’s the one that Jay _birthed,_ Nick doesn’t even really _do_ anything, except for help babysit sometimes. And she doesn’t even babysit _well,_ not like Louis does.

“Hey, you could look at your own child, you know.” Louis mutters, bouncing Doris up and down in her arms, and Jay grins at her, a twinkle in her eye that Louis doesn’t trust one bit.

“You stare at Nick all the time, sweetheart,” Jay smirks, “it must run in the family.”

Louis wrinkles her nose at her mum, ready to protest, but then Nick wraps her arms around Louis’s waist and she loses her train of thought. It isn’t fair that Nick has this much power over her, that the feeling of Nick’s arms tight around her is like falling asleep. Or, like, something less sappy.

“Hello, Jay,” she trills over Louis’s shoulder, “I’m baking a cake.”

Louis smacks Nick in the boob.

“ _We’re_ baking a cake, because I am helpful.”

Jay gives her an unimpressed look at the same time that Nick starts cackling, like she’s said something particularly hilarious.

She hates them both.

                                                                                                **+**

It’s noon by the time Louis’s hangover has disappeared for long enough that walking doesn’t make her want to die, so they make their way to the tiny park at the corner of Louis’s street with the twins.

It’s soothing, being surrounded by the babies and Nick, and memories from her childhood, helps to ease off some of the stress she’s been under recently. She wishes, sometimes, that her gender was more of a solid. It’s tiring to have days full of dysphoria and hatred of her body, but then when she can actually do something about it she’s  back to feeling okay again. It’s tiring, makes her feel a bit like maybe she’s faking it, despite how many times Nick has told her that she isn’t, that it’s just a part of her.

“I’m sorry your nan was shit, Nick.” Louis says, watching as Doris toddles up the steps of the tiny slide next to them, almost falling right over. Nick reaches up without even glancing, and helps her steady herself. Nick is probably magical.

Nick turns back to her, eyes crinkled with the sunlight, freckles standing out on her pale face. She looks ethereal, like some sort of otherworldly being sent forth to make Louis’s life both better and more complicated all at the same time.

“It’s fine, really. It might not have been last year, but I’m more comfortable now than I’ve ever been.” Still, Louis grabs her hand and slots their fingers together.

She misses the way that a smile twitches onto Nick’s face, but she doesn’t miss Ernest running straight into Doris and toppling right down the slide.

**+**

Louis sleeps over Nick’s, that night, and when they both climb into Nick’s absurdly huge bed, the girl suddenly chokes out a “I need to tell you something.”

Louis stills, hands starting to tremble where they’re curled in her lap, eyes focused on Nick in the dark. It has to be important; normally Nick just talks about what she wants to. She doesn’t get scared, or worried, she doesn’t hold back.

“Yeah?” She asks, shuffling towards her, comforting smile on her face. “Go on, then.”

Nick takes a deep breath, looks Louis in the eye, and says, “I’m in love with you.”

Louis freezes, smile locking on her face, even her hands stilling.

The thing is, she’s wanted this for so long, for weeks, months and years, and now that Nick’s said it she doesn’t know how to react. Nick is such a huge part of her life, in every way, and Louis wants her to be her girlfriend, to get to kiss her and fuck her and tell her she’s everything she’s ever wanted. But now she knows Nick likes her, she can’t speak she’s so happy.

Nick is trembling, and even in the dark Louis can see the tears building in her eyes, the way she’s just barely biting back tears.

So she does the one thing she can; she kisses her.

It isn’t like fireworks, or sparks, or lightning. It isn’t a moment of knowing, or anything particularly world changing. It’s them, and it’s good, biting and harsh and soft all at once, Nick’s hand tucking under her shirt, teeth clicking together because neither of them can stop smiling.

It isn’t world changing, but it still feels magical, the way that Nick pulls her on top of her, chest heaving, fingers looping into Louis’s longer hair. It feels like a burn, a heat rippling just under the surface of her skin where she can’t scratch it away. She thinks that maybe Nick could try.

“So you like me, then?” Nick breathes, pulling away, the sound slick.

“I’ve always liked you,” she breathes back, fingers brushing Nick’s hip, feeling the goose bumps erupt all over her skin, “don’t let it go to your head.”

“I’ll give you head,” Nick grins, tongue flicking out, and Louis shudders on top of her.

She thinks that she could get used to this. She thinks that, out of all of the confusing things in her life, this is the one thing that makes sense.

"Go on, then."

**Author's Note:**

> [tumblr](http://arofic.tumblr.com/)


End file.
